Now it can be told: September was a pretty great month for interviews on Twirl Radio. To review: Ronnie Barnett of The Muffs, Sparklejet, Addison Love, and Danny Wilkerson. Most radio people, including myself, would give their eye teeth for a set of interviews like this (by the way–if you find my eye teeth, please let me know!). So to cap off this stellar month, and to begin my favorite season, Fall, I knew we had to do something special. So we had as our very special guest, Kenn Goodman, founder of venerable indie label Pravda Records, and founding member of Chicago band The Imperial Sound.

The Imperial Sound has rapidly become one of my favorite new bands. It was started by Kenn and his longtime musical partner Rick Mosher, as the next logical step beyond their legendary band The New Duncan Imperials. Their sound is big, fun, brash at times, and more introspective other times. It’s grown up and sophisticated, yet still rocks. It’s an amalgam of rock, blues, and jazz. You could say Stax meets Burt Bacharach, but gets hijacked by ska and punk rock along the way, and you’d be pretty close. I admitted to Kenn that on paper, I’m normally not a big fan of music with lots of horns and keyboards–but this band really, really works for me. I am NOW a fan of music with lots of horns and keyboards–it just has to be done the way The Imperial Sound does it. And vocalists–wow, not only do most of the six band members sing, but they had the luxury of bringing in several other guest vocalists on some of the songs. Folks like Peter Himmelman, Nora O’Connor, and Dag Juhlin. (On a side note: Chloe Orwell, of longtime Twirl favorite band The Handcuffs, now sings with The Imperial Sound during their live gigs!) Check them out, and buy their record: http://www.theimperialsound.com

We also spent a few minutes chatting about Kenn’s amazing company, Pravda Records, and the breadth of music showcased there, including Twirl favorites Sunshine Boys and The Diplomats of Solid Sound. Check out this label–you’re sure to find some music you’ll love: www.pravdamusic.com.

Today’s show also started with a world radio debut of a new track from Vegas With Randolph, “You Could Say Yes”. Talk about starting the show with a bang! It’s an uplifting, rockin’ tune from their soon to be released fourth album, “Legs & Luggage”. And for those of you Twirlsters in the know–we’ll be having Eric Kern and John Ratts from VWR on our show in the very near future!

I’ve known Danny Wilkerson for several years now. He’s best known as the drummer and occasional singer/songwriter for Texas power pop legends The Pengwins, along with another Twirl Radio staple, Lannnie Flowers. I’ve hung out with him in Texas each year for the past 4 years, on what’s becoming kind of an annual music nerd pilgrimage to Arlington, TX. He’s got an upbeat, positive personality, always quick to joke around or offer a kind word. A huge music fan, and a bit of a practical joker too–but I’ll tell you about that another time.

So knowing those things about a person, what would you expect a solo record of his to contain? Maybe upbeat music, positive lyrics, a sense of humor, all crafted with care, and with an understanding of what came before him. Lo and behold–that’s exactly the kind of album Danny released! His solo debut album, “Wilkerson”, is all of those things. It’s a bit of a throwback to an earlier time–when releasing pop music that sounded good to everybody, and could get played on the radio, actually mattered. Several different styles figure prominently on this album–it’s a pop tour de force. He’s got some impressive collaborators, including Bleu McAuley and Roger Joseph Manning Jr. Just get this one. It comes with 180 gram vinyl, a CD, and a digital download card. Big thanks to Spyderpop Records for releasing this masterpiece. www.dannywilkerson.com

On this week’s show, we meet Southern California based singer/ songwriter/ multi-instrumentalist Addison Love. As it happens, we at Twirl Radio are no strangers to his music. A few years ago, when he was still in high school, he was part of the trio Yorktown Lads (along with his music instructor/ mentor Mike Simmons). The credo for that band was “if you write the song, you sing the song”. So flash forward to 2018, and his first solo record, “Thoughts On Lunch?”, comes out on Big Stir Records, and the rest is history. If it’s on Big Stir, it’s good. And if Addison writes it, it’s good.

He’s just 22 years old, but musically speaking, he’s an old soul. His most obvious influences include The Beatles and Beach Boys, and they are present on the record. “Like The Beatles” spells that out fairly clearly–if the girl doesn’t love The Beatles, how can she love him? “Wee & Nancy Lee” is a great upbeat earworm that has been lodged in my brain for the past few weeks, and will be one of your favorites as well, I’m sure. There are some great ballads here too. There’s a level of sophistication to these songs that many artists never reach, but comes rather easily for Addison. And in his musical studies right now, he’s learning even more instruments that are not usually found inside the rock genre. He’s also got several music projects going on right now, and lots more music to come. That’s good news for us music fans. We had a fun chat, and covered a lot of musical ground. I even learned the answer to my pressing question–how did he come up with the album title “Thoughts On Lunch?” You can learn even more about Addison at http://www.addisonlovemusic.com/.

Artist | Track | Album
Banjo Bones | Dangerous Game | Ghostly Musings From The Delta
Claire Coupland | This One’s For The Road | On The Other Side
The Welcome Matt | My Town | More Empire Days
Pugwash | Easier Done Than Said | Silverlake
Daniel Trigger | Running Into The Wind | Right Turn
Maxi Dunn | Don’t Look Back | Welcome To Soonville
Steve Barton | The Day My Baby Went Blind | Tall Tales & Alibis 3

Only eight days in, and September has turned into a rather amazing month for the show. This week, the Fresno power trio Sparklejet drove up Highway 99 and made Twirl Radio their first Sacramento stop. Victor Sotelo, Wade Krause, and Chris Estep spent well over an hour with me, in an unstructured (my fault), free-ranging conversation. We heard some great examples of their music from the past decade or so, and talked about how it all come together.

This visit was particularly auspicious for a few reasons. It was the first time they’d been to Sacramento in over a decade, and that night was to be their first show at the venerable tavern, Old Ironsides, in over 20 years. And–Victor had recently released his first solo record, “Homeland Insecurities”–and it is a good one. Every bit as good as the Sparklejet releases–just different.

Sparklejet is a seriously hard-rocking band. They’re both studious and reckless. They put much care and effort into their songs, and they perform them with reckless abandon. I like to think of them as “intellectual hard rock”. They’re not afraid to try new things. I liked talking with these guys–as important as their music is, they never take themselves too seriously, so we were able to have a light-hearted chat about serious topics. They even brought along a few tracks to play for the show. I think you need to get to know them a little better.

Artist | Track | Album
Maxi Dunn | How Was I To Know | Welcome To Soonville
McPherson Grant | Big Picture People | Song
Curtis Mayfield | Superfly | The Very Best Of Curtis Mayfield
Lannie Flowers | Don’t Make Me Wait | Single release
Astral Drive | Wishing I Could Change The World | Astral Drive
The Imperial Sound | Get Along! | The New AM
The Cherry Bluestorms | Out | Whirligig!

So I got this text message from Stephen “Spaz” Schnee the other day, telling me that Ronnie Barnett, founding member of The Muffs, was going to be in Sacramento over the Labor Day weekend. Now Spaz has been telling me for a while that the next time his friend Ronnie comes up to Sacramento, I should try to get him on Twirl Radio. Since this was “the next time”, I took that as my opportunity to invite him on. And what happened afterwards was fairly epic. I got not just Ronnie, but his fiance Julie, and Spaz himself. A nice full studio of fun people.

Ronnie and I chatted about The Muffs’ history, his history as a bass player and music fan, and we played a few tracks from the band’s legendary 1993 debut album. The four of us talked about a whole bunch of things including that so-important topic, Jimboy’s Tacos (a Sacramento “thing”, to be sure). That hour went by incredibly quickly, and I look forward to another visit sometime in the future. https://www.facebook.com/TheMuffsMusic

Then to kick off the second hour, Spaz fulfilled a long-running inside joke of ours. Since last November, he would occasionally ask me if I was going to play a track from the new Christopher Cross album. (Christopher Cross, as you may recall, was the “captain of early 80’s yacht rock”.) So he finally got to play a track from that album. Moral of the story: if you want something done right, do it yourself! He also treated me to a brand new Gilbert O’Sullivan track as well!

And we rolled out some more brand new 2018 music–and I even kicked off the show with perhaps the only Labor Day song I’ve ever heard: “Labor Day”, by William Cleere + The Marvellous Fellas, a great duet between William Cleere and Karla Kane of The Corner Laughers. A great song for a nice long weekend. Enjoy the show–it was a particularly spirited episode!